46 SOUTH COUNTRY TROUT STREAMS 



contain trout ; but it is only a few miles in length 

 from source to sea. Kearsney is perhaps the best 

 place for the angler who has permission to fish to 

 stay at. As regards the upper parts of the 

 IMedway which contain trout, East Grinstead 

 may be mentioned, and Hcadcorn, on the stream 

 called the Beult. There are plenty of coarse 

 fish lower down the Med way, but no trout. The 

 river is not, indeed, adapted to the Sabnonidce 

 save here and there in its head waters. 



The Stour,the biggest of the Kent trout streams, is 

 forty-five miles in length. It flows through the east of 



The the county, rising about fifteen miles north- 

 Stour west of Ashford, and entering the sea at 

 a point about seven miles from Sandwich. It was 

 described by Skrine, in his Principal Rivers of 

 Great Britain, as a very circuitous stream. " The 

 Stoure," he says, " after leaving Ashford, traverses 

 a sweet vale," a statement which certainly holds 

 as good to-day as it did in the early part of the 

 century. Best, who wrote at about the same 

 period, included the Stour among the four most 

 famous trout streams ; the others being the Kennet 

 near Hungerford, the Wandle near Carshalton, 

 and the Amerly in Sussex, the last named of 

 which must surely have sadly deteriorated within 

 the last century if Best were correct in his estimate. 

 He also stated that " the Stower " was reputed 

 to breed " the best trout in the south-east of Eng-- 

 land," at which there is perhaps not much to 

 cavil. The best trouting on the Stour at present 

 is not in the upper reaches, but between Wye 

 and Canterbury, though there are trout mixed 

 with coarse fish between the former place and 

 the source of the stream, as well as in a feeder 

 which rises near Westcnhanger station, and after 



